Feb 24, 2006

Illustration Friday - Tea

I love tea. I have a whole cupboard full of tea.Behind the tea in the picture is much more tea. It is three layers deep.

Read on only if you'll enjoy seeing some of the thoughts, notes, photos that preceded choosing my final illustration.

Immediately after I saw the week's theme of "tea", I wanted to do something about having tea with Gertrude Stein. Lots of people had tea with Stein, served by Alice, of course. And I always liked that poem of hers with the lines:

Notes I made when I googled: "Gertrude Stein" tea02.24.06 - TEAFrom Tender Buttons:Lovely snipe and tender turn, excellent vapor and slender butter, all the splinter and the trunk, all the poisonous darkning drunk, all the joy in weak success, all the joyful tenderness, all the section and the tea, all the stouter symmetry.

[emphasis mine]

It's Down to Earth for Gertrude SteinA biographer charts the reality behind a legendary life.by Dottie Hornhttp://research.unc.edu/endeavors/end496/stein.htm1920Paris, 27, rue de Fleurus. Friends and strangers, aspiring writers and others, drop in around tea time at the Paris apartment of American Gertrude Stein, famous after having published the novel Three Lives in 1909 and the long prose poem Tender Buttons in 1914. Gertrude's lover, Alice Toklas, serves cookies she has made and tea in white cups at the gatherings, for which no invitation is required. Gertrude talks about writing, about the importance of concentration, of tapping into the essence of being, or soul.-------------11. Ernest Hemingway Like a museum... we ... loved the big studio with the great paintings. It was like one of the best rooms in the finest museum except there was a big fireplace and it was warm and comfortable and they gave you good things to eat and tea and natural distilled liqueurs made from purple plums, yellow plums or wild raspberries. (...)

--------------------Other photos:the cup and mug cupboard:

I moved a couple of cups so I could call this "Time for Tea with George Orwell" but the Orwell mug isn't very clear...and finally, the detritus of my cup of tea this morning:

This appealed to my minimalist urge and was very nearly the picture I chose...but I'm not feeling very minimalist today.

I almost took out all the tea from the cupboard to photograph. But that is probably a picture to do for my decluttering blog.

If you've read this far and love tea, you might enjoy the Tea Mind, Be Kind blog of Maitri Libellule.

7 Comments:

Great photos. My mom is the same way with tea, she has all different types. I'm a one type of tea at a time person, cinnamon apple is my current fave. My daughter, Katy, loves her cup of sleepy time with honey before bed every night and is convinced she can't sleep with out it.

Oh, SP, I love the hearts mug, in fact, I had this morning's tea in it. If you look closely, you can also see the tea you sent me tucked into the bottom right corner of the tea cupboard photo!I wondered if you would notice your mug - and it wasn't staged for the photo either!love,'zann

About Me

Professor's wife, mother of four, zannma to two. Grew up in Coral Gables, Florida, transplanted to Indiana at age 40, where I saw my first snow and learned to love wool. We homeschooled three of the kids, I helped to create a used bookshop ( Wabash River Books 1996-2005)and became an online bookseller. I started this blog in 2005 to share my mid-life artwork (primarily fiber), poetry and creative explorations. On March 18, 2006 my 20 year-old son Patrick died...and my world irrevocably changed.
I own 64 years now. Life is very mysterious, magickal, beautiful and sweet and sad.